Atlas Shrugged Producer John Aglialoro on Ayn Rand's Enduring Impact

[Reidy]

Silly at best. In the unlikely worst case (i.e. if anyone takes your insinuations seriously) you could be risking legal action. Whether or not that succeeds would be up to the jury.

This wouldn't be the first time movie backers took a loss for some favored cause. They must know by now that politically preachy movies usually lose money, yet Elysium, Promised Land, Valley of Elah, Lions and Lambs and Rendition, to name a very few, got financing.

[Wolf DeVoon]

... if anyone takes your insinuations seriously you could be risking legal action ...

What insinuations?

Snider bailed him out on Atlas Part I. He says he borrowed $20 million to make Part II (from who?)

That brings us to mystery funding of Part III - another $20 million or so - no chance of payback

Part II gross $3,336,053 (about $600,000 net) + DVD (not in top 100, maybe $200,000 net)

Everything else I said about producers, distribution, and deferments is simple movie arithmetic.

[Francisco Ferrer]

People without experience in movies have no perspective on what works and what doesn't. But the same is true in any profession that is a complex mixture of art and technology.

[Brant Gaede]

I don't see any good reason to go into the supposed or possible background financial and other machinations of these movies.

The irony is a much better job would have been done in what--1972?--if Ayn Rand hadn't spiked it. It would have been a better time for it too. I think she spiked two serious deals. She was too well aware how Hollywood treats authors.

I don't blame her for that though, not at all. I personally think, but do not know, that it's Leonard Peikoff getting back at Ayn Rand for sundry things. There's so much wrong about how he has handled her intellectual estate.

The world of 2014 has become too debased for ideas. Things have to run to their conclusions, then we start again.

--Brant

the left gave up on ideas over 40 years ago, kept the debasements, and put the culture into the blender

the right gave up on ideas so long ago you wonder if they ever had any to give up on in the first place

enter, the Objectivists and the libertarians: "Hey! Where is everybody"?

[Wolf DeVoon]

I don't see any good reason to go into the supposed or possible background financial and other machinations of these movies.

The irony is a much better job would have been done in what--1972?--if Ayn Rand hadn't spiked it. It would have been a better time for it too. I think she spiked two serious deals. She was too well aware how Hollywood treats authors.

I don't blame her for that though, not at all. I personally think, but do not know, that it's Leonard Peikoff getting back at Ayn Rand for sundry things. There's so much wrong about how he has handled her intellectual estate.

The world of 2014 has become too debased for ideas. Things have to run to their conclusions, then we start again.

--Brant

the left gave up on ideas over 40 years ago, kept the debasements, and put the culture into the blender

the right gave up on ideas so long ago you wonder if they ever had any to give up on in the first place

enter, the Objectivists and the libertarians: "Hey! Where is everybody"?

Brant, that post was so good, every single proposition, that I had to quote it big and bold and blue. Working in reverse order, it explains why we congregate, slightly aghast at our freres and fellow travelers of The Remnant (as chess master Bill Orton calls it). Yep, the christian right in particular and hand on heart Republicans generally have nothing to defend except apple pie and flag-draped parades and coffins -- which seem positively benevolent compared to the debasements of zombified entertainment and higher ed. Running to a conclusion is upon us financially, rather like Wile E. Coyote suspended in mid-air ten feet from the cliff edge, with roadrunner Barack Obama sticking his tongue out at us from the fairway and laughing: 'Meep, meep!"

Cousin Leonard the Looter, ain't it the truth, hocking the last bar of gold in the cupboard when he sold Atlas to Aglialoro, expecting a big Happy Meal payoff. I haven't seen the deal memo, but "leasing" the film rights to a book property is not how anyone at William Morris or Curtis Brown ever talks about an option, which is small money paid upfront for the legal right to exercise a much bigger agreed-upon split. Peikoff the Second-Hander loses again. His percentage of box office gross or producer's net turned out to be a hot turd sandwich and two black eyes, courtesy of David Kelley, the soft-spoken ARI flunkie he fired.

I worked with Ruddy. You're right. He would have cut Atlas to two hours, made it a love triangle, left Francisco on the cutting room floor.

About being bad-tempered and slamming the farce with both fists and a rock -- well, that's me, or what's left of what used to be me.

[Brant Gaede]

I have no way to evaluate the essentially man of ideas, David Kelley, except through his books even though I was there when he read "If" at Ayn Rand's burial. What I do know is Leonard Peikoff went completely off the rails in 1986 when The Passion of Ayn Rand came out and David didn't. That was Leonard's one good chance to get out from under Ayn's dead thumb and be his own man, which would have redeemed the previous eight years. Instead, he set himself up as the Grand Poop Bah of Objectivism.

--Brant

my evaluation of Kelley is positive plus

[Wolf DeVoon]

my evaluation of Kelley is positive plus

 

He had a grand start... handsome and articulate, a dead ringer for John Galt in 1991.

 

Especially gratifying that he spoke of need to extend the philosophy in legal questions.

[Guyau]

I use those Cybex machines at my health club, and when I see that name on them, I think fondly of John Aglialoro and his difficult and generous project of making the Atlas Shrugged films. I know one of his motives, and a motive of other contributors, was Republican political propaganda, which is not big with me. But I expect they also wanted to seduce new reading of Rand’s novel and to experience a motion picture of it. I had always wanted (but dreaded)—nearly five decades now since first reading the book—to see it in film. Walter and I enjoyed the first two, and we’re looking forward to III this weekend (with trepidation, to be sure, given what I’ve heard of the voicing of Dagny and Galt). I had always worried that by seeing an Atlas movie my own images I had formed from first reading the book would be weakened. That proved not-to-worry. I just see these movies as products of others working together to craft a certain resultant visual transport of their perspective on the book to a contemporary setting. I retain my own reader images, voices, persons, dramatic effects, and ideas perfectly the same as from the first read.

We had not been to a movie theater in many years, but we wanted to see these on the big screen. Boy, the technology had advanced a lot, especially sound! I loved the opening of Part I, with the pull-back to learn you are on a train. I liked the Rearden of Part I and of Part II. I liked the Dagny of both those Parts, but especially the Dagny of Part III. Lillian of Part I was great. I loved the Ellis Wyatt of Part I.

From the interview with Mr. Aglialoro, I warmed to his stories of childhood money-making. My brother and I were like that. On our folks’ acreage, we raised berries, which we sold door-to-door in the neighborhood. We did yard work for neighbors. I raised bees and sold the honey. When we were big enough, we caddied at the nearby country club: $3 for 18 holes. About that time, the book Atlas Shrugged entered (but not yet into our young world).

[Wolf DeVoon]

 

Aglialoro @ 29.00  "Not getting a fair shake" from critics

Kaslow   @ 32.00  "These guys in Hollywood don't have any courage"

Kaslow   @ 33.00  "Hollywood isn't going to produce this movie"

Scott      @ 35.00  "Make the dialog contemporary"

Aglialoro @ 38.00  "We were rushed" on Part 1 and Part 2

Kaslow   @ 39.00   Part 3 will "take advantage of free publicity...word of mouth"

Kaslow   @ 42.00   audience "most of them Republican, over 50, Christian"

Aglialoro @ 47.00  "Video sales are picking up...let's hope"

Scott      @ 49.00  "Trying to engage the audience" [younger people]

Kaslow   @ 51.00  "It's all about excitement...we'll figure something out"

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

From the interview with Mr. Aglialoro, I warmed to his stories of childhood money-making. My brother and I were like that. On our folks’ acreage, we raised berries, which we sold door-to-door in the neighborhood. We did yard work for neighbors.

Stephen,

That thing about picking blackberries brought back some memories that had been lost down the memory hole for a while.

We didn't sell them, though. We were poor and my mother used to can them as preserves for the winter. (Happy times, those...) I can't remember how much Mom paid for my brother and me to pick them, but it was something like a few pennies a pint. Our arms would get all scratched up and we had fun with the sundry bugs that would appear (especially spiders).

How can kids have fun with spiders? Heh... But we did...

I also did my share of yard work for neighbors. I even did some of that when I got older at Boston University, except up there, I tapped into a vein of rich folks who needed it.

I think Aglialoro is a decent man. Maybe not the best man to produce the Atlas Shrugged movie, but he was the one who got it done. Just navigating all the irrationality around that project over the decades would make a great comedy.

Michael

[Wolf DeVoon]

I've been thinking about who the victim was, the guy who compromised, sanctioned it, and should have known better.

Not Peikoff the thief. Not Kaslow the hired gun. Mr. and Mrs. Aglialoro were rubes who bet big and lost at hold 'em.

That leaves one guy who had intellectual responsibility, could have stopped it and didn't.

[Brant Gaede]

I've been thinking about who the victim was, the guy who compromised, sanctioned it, and should have known better.

Not Peikoff the thief. Not Kaslow the hired gun. Mr. and Mrs. Aglialoro were rubes who bet big and lost at hold 'em.

That leaves one guy who had intellectual responsibility, could have stopped it and didn't.

Sorry. The idea of the movie isn't the ideas through the movie so much as an interesting story well told to encourage readership of the novel itself.

--Brant

the movie, as done, means next to nothing except no one will repeat the effort for 20 - 40 more years: it should have been done 40 years ago!

[Wolf DeVoon]

The idea of the movie isn't the ideas through the movie so much as an interesting story well told to encourage readership of the novel itself.

Huh? ... After you saw Braveheart did you read the biography of William Wallace?

Actually, the comparison is absurd. Braveheart grossed $200 million, nominated for 10 Academy Awards and won five.

Paid admissions to see Aglialoro's stinko soap opera in empty theaters were people who read her book decades ago.

Like many people who admire Ayn Rand’s novel Atlas Shrugged, my reaction upon seeing the first film to be adapted from it has

been far from wholly positive. Some with a thorough understanding of the novel have said they have made allowances in declaring

that they enjoyed the film, while others have declared it boring. The movie struck me as lame. [David P. Hayes]

Part Two was worse: Box office slid from $4.6 million to $3.3 million on wide release and closed in 7 weeks.

Encouraging readership of the novel? -- exactly the reverse, defaming novel and author both.

Part 3: "Galt as studmuffin." [scott Holleran] "Nothing says 'epic' like a movie shot in 17 days." [Deadline Hollywood comment]

[Backlighting]

From the interview with Mr. Aglialoro, I warmed to his stories of childhood money-making. My brother and I were like that. On our folks’ acreage, we raised berries, which we sold door-to-door in the neighborhood. We did yard work for neighbors.

Stephen,

That thing about picking blackberries brought back some memories that had been lost down the memory hole for a while.

We didn't sell them, though. We were poor and my mother used to can them as preserves for the winter. (Happy times, those...) I can't remember how much Mom paid for my brother and me to pick them, but it was something like a few pennies a pint. Our arms would get all scratched up and we had fun with the sundry bugs that would appear (especially spiders).

How can kids have fun with spiders? Heh... But we did...

I also did my share of yard work for neighbors. I even did some of that when I got older at Boston University, except up there, I tapped into a vein of rich folks who needed it.

I think Aglialoro is a decent man. Maybe not the best man to produce the Atlas Shrugged movie, but he was the one who got it done. Just navigating all the irrationality around that project over the decades would make a great comedy.

Michael

I can relate to the stories of you both. Brings back the memories.

Caddied, shoveled snow, was a pin-boy & sold and tied to the customers cars, xmas trees (tips only). I was in my early teens then.

I also believe Agliaro to be a decent man & the task to get it to screen monumental. He got it done & I couldn't.

I'll see Pt. 3 when it is released on DVD, probably 3-6 months after it hits the big screen. I'm sure I will like parts of it.

[Brant Gaede]

The idea of the movie isn't the ideas through the movie so much as an interesting story well told to encourage readership of the novel itself.

Huh? ... After you saw Braveheart did you read the biography of William Wallace?

Actually, the comparison is absurd. Braveheart grossed $200 million, nominated for 10 Academy Awards and won five.

Paid admissions to see Aglialoro's stinko soap opera in empty theaters were people who read her book decades ago.

Like many people who admire Ayn Rand’s novel Atlas Shrugged, my reaction upon seeing the first film to be adapted from it has

been far from wholly positive. Some with a thorough understanding of the novel have said they have made allowances in declaring

that they enjoyed the film, while others have declared it boring. The movie struck me as lame. [David P. Hayes]

Part Two was worse: Box office slid from $4.6 million to $3.3 million on wide release and closed in 7 weeks.

Encouraging readership of the novel? -- exactly the reverse, defaming novel and author both.

Part 3 preview: "Galt as studmuffin." [scott Holleran] "No way to do it justice with a 16 day shoot." [Deadline comment]

I should have said "a" movie, not "the" movie. I was trying to be generic.

--Brant

my bag

[Jerry Biggers]

[Jerry Biggers]

I did something that seemed to screw up the sequence of my last posts....Sorry

Wolf DeVoon, on 11 Sept 2014 - 6:17 PM, said:

I've been thinking about who the victim was, the guy who compromised, sanctioned it, and should have known better.

Not Peikoff the thief. Not Kaslow the hired gun. Mr. and Mrs. Aglialoro were rubes who bet big and lost at hold 'em.

That leaves one guy who had intellectual responsibility, could have stopped it and didn't.

I assume that the "guy wiho had intellectual responsibility," is a reference to Kelley. However, he cannot do whatever he wants to, he has to follow the suggestions of the TAS Board of Directors, which of course includes Aglialoro. For Kelley or anyone else to go against Aglialoro's wishes, since he has been a major contributor and also had the option to produce the movie, was highly unlikely. Reportedly, they even changed the name from The Objectivist Center to The Atlas Society in order to benefit on what they thought would, ultimately, bring new interest and support to TAS. If the movie Atlas 3, is a bomb, some of the responsibility for its failure (or, its success....I'm whistling in the dark) will fall onto the TAS leadership.

[Wolf DeVoon]

.

"But what can you do when you have to deal with people?"

I just had a really bad feeling about Galt's oath. I swear by my life and my love of it...

Aglialoro: "Ayn Rand made a mistake."

Oh shit, didn't want to, but I have to see Part 3 to find out if he cut Galt's oath.

[Reidy]

Do we have any evidence that the movies helped - or, for that matter, hurt - sales of the book? Barbara Branden points out that the (dreadful) adaptation of The Fountainhead put the book back on the bestseller list. Did anything like that happen in this case? If people had gone to see the movies and on that basis made up their minds about the book, it would have gone out of print two weeks after part 1 hit the screen.

[Wolf DeVoon]

Do we have any evidence that the movies helped - or, for that matter, hurt - sales of the book? Barbara Branden points out that the (dreadful) adaptation of The Fountainhead put the book back on the bestseller list. Did anything like that happen in this case?

Publishers Weekly (this was an enormous pain the ass, searching each year, hardcover and paper)

Atlas Shrugged. Ayn Rand. Rep. Plume

2009 148,695 paperback on Wall Street Journal buzz about people "going Galt" after Obama win

2010 less than 100,000 paperback

2011 less than 100,000 paperback

2012 less than 100,000 paperback

2013 less than 100,000 paperback

Atlas Shrugged. Ayn Rand. Rep. Plume

2009 less than 100,000 hardcover

2010 less than 100,000 hardcover to put this in context, a Lee Childs 'Jack Reacher' hardcover

2011 less than 100,000 hardcover sells 350,000 in first year, then goes to paperback

2012 less than 100,000 hardcover

2013 less than 100,000 hardcover

Google Trends:

a big spike of traffic on release of Part 1 and another big spike on release of Part 2

half of the traffic was from Russia, half from US, hitting Wikipedia and movie pages

No discernible increase in hardcover or paperback sales

Okay e-book sales in 2011, down 1/3 in 2012

Amazon:

trade paper #1,435 in Books

mass market #9,104 in Books

hardcover #69,151 in Books

about half of the reviews are people who read Atlas decades ago, bought a new copy, Kindle, or audio

a little shocked to see reviews based on Cliff's Notes version included in reviews of Atlas paperback

[Brant Gaede]

Do we have any evidence that the movies helped - or, for that matter, hurt - sales of the book? Barbara Branden points out that the (dreadful) adaptation of The Fountainhead put the book back on the bestseller list. Did anything like that happen in this case? If people had gone to see the movies and on that basis made up their minds about the book, it would have gone out of print two weeks after part 1 hit the screen.

It was very far from dreadful. There were serious problems. Nathaniel Branden said Rand wanted to open up the story so she could work the character development more, but she had to do a 90 minute screenplay.

--Brant

[Wolf DeVoon]

I have a low threshold of cinematic pain. I've decided to wait until someone else reports whether or not they cut Galt's oath.

[Brant Gaede]

I have a low threshold of cinematic pain. I've decided to wait until someone else reports whether or not they cut Galt's oath.

If they do that it's damn them to hell stupidity and moral traducification of Rand's basic vision. When Jack Warner cut that one line from Roark's speech he was likely merely asserting his head-of-the-studio alpha male status more than anything else even though I suspect he hated it too. For the movie we are talking about it's likely an expression of vapidity--moral and intellectual--which I consider worst of the worse.

--Brant

[Wolf DeVoon]

I have a low threshold of cinematic pain. I've decided to wait until someone else reports whether or not they cut Galt's oath.

If they do that it's damn them to hell stupidity and moral traducification of Rand's basic vision. When Jack Warner cut that one line from Roark's speech he was likely merely asserting his head-of-the-studio alpha male status more than anything else even though I suspect he hated it too. For the movie we are talking about it's likely an expression of vapidity--moral and intellectual--which I consider worst of the worse.

--Brant

It seems impossible, but I'm worried nonetheless. I fret over stupid stuff, imaginary hobgoblins.

[Brant Gaede]

I have a low threshold of cinematic pain. I've decided to wait until someone else reports whether or not they cut Galt's oath.

If they do that it's damn them to hell stupidity and moral traducification of Rand's basic vision. When Jack Warner cut that one line from Roark's speech he was likely merely asserting his head-of-the-studio alpha male status more than anything else even though I suspect he hated it too. For the movie we are talking about it's likely an expression of vapidity--moral and intellectual--which I consider worst of the worse.

--Brant

It seems impossible, but I'm worried nonetheless. I fret over stupid stuff, imaginary hobgoblins.

In spite of what I wrote, it really doesn't matter. These movies don't matter. Objectivism, the Philosophy of Ayn Rand now needs to be transmogrified into Objectivism, noting and respecting the difference. That is not Atlas Shrugged. The novel is not a real-world work of art. If it were it would contain the unspeakable horror of tens upon tens of millions starving to death, mass riots and killings and thermonuclear war as an option. The settled result would be the world of The Road, not "going back into the world" of happy and productive existence freed from the grip of the looters.

--Brant